Sammy Woods
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 Australia (AUS) |
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| Batting style | Right-hand bat | |
| Bowling type | Right-arm fast-medium | |
| Tests | First-class | |
| Matches | 6 | 401 |
| Runs scored | 154 | 15345 |
| Batting average | 15.40 | 23.42 |
| 100s/50s | 0/1 | 19/62 |
| Top score | 53 | 215 |
| Balls bowled | 412 | 41207 |
| Wickets | 10 | 1040 |
| Bowling average | 25.00 | 20.81 |
| 5 wickets in innings | 0 | 77 |
| 10 wickets in match | 0 | 21 |
| Best bowling | 3/28 | 10/69 |
| Catches/stumpings | 5/0 | 279/0 |
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Test debut: 16 July 1888 |
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Sammy Woods (Samuel Moses James Woods; born April 13, 1867, Ashfield, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia; died April 30, 1931, Taunton, Somerset, England) was an outstanding cricketer for Cambridge University in his early career and later the long-time captain of Somerset in their early years of Championship cricket. He was one of the few players to represent both England and Australia in Tests. Unusually, he also played rugby union for England, and played regularly for Bridgwater & Albion.
He was educated at Sydney Grammar School and Royston College, Sydney, before Brighton College and Cambridge University where he won blues in both rugby football and cricket.
Although he was most famous as a fast bowler, Woods lost his bowling at quite an early stage of his long career and retained his value to Somerset mainly as a hard-hitting batsman who played what are still some of the fastest innings in the history of county cricket. His highest score for Somerset, 215 against Sussex in 1895, took only 150 minutes, whilst in 1898 at Eastbourne he hit 132 before lunch to give Somerset their only victory of the season.
In his early days as a bowler Woods was not only fast and accurate but was renowned for his cleverly disguised slower ball and a deadly "yorker". Between 1888 and 1892 Woods took 507 wickets in English first-class cricket for 8275 runs - an average of 16.32 runs a wicket, and was generally regarded as the best bowler of real pace in the world. However, his body was unable to sustain long spells of bowling as he grew old, and his decline as a bowler was immediately apparent from 1893, so much so that he rarely bowled from 1896 onwards.
Strangely, Woods played no first-class cricket in his youth in Australia, but in 1888 for Cambridge he bowled so well that, with support for Turner and Ferris desperately wanted, Woods was allowed to join the Australian team after the University season. He did not do well in the Tests, and took only eleven wickets for 298 runs for the touring team. For his overall performances that season, the following year's Wisden named him as one of its Cricketers of the Year, in the initial season of that feature. In the following two years, he cemented his reputation as the best fast bowler in the business, with the highlight being his taking of all ten wickets against CI Thornton's XI in his first match as Cambridge captain. The following year, after again bowling in his best form for Cambridge, Woods spearheaded the rapid development of Somerset in their first season in the County Championship, where they showed their improvement by rebounding from a horrifying loss by an innings and 375 runs at The Oval in May to beat the previously unbeaten Surrey side in August. Woods also helped the Gentlemen beat the Players at the Oval with nine wickets - dividing honours with his former teammate Ferris.
In 1892, Woods had his best season as a bowler with 153 wickets in all matches. His 85 wickets for 16.47 in the County Championship helped Somerset to its best season until the 1960s, and in the Festival matches, he accomplished two splendid performances:
- 13 for 109 for West of England v East of England at Portsmouth
- 8 for 46 (first innings) for Gentlemen v Players at Hastings
However, the fact that Woods was hit for 201 runs (amazing for a fast bowler) in the second innings of that match suggested a possible decline, which was proven totally correct in 1893. In all matches, his haul of wickets fell by almost 50 percent and his average went up by the same amount. Only once, against Sussex at Taunton, did he bowl in his previous form. Being appointed captain and secretary of Somerset the following year did little to reverse his decline as a bowler. However, the following year, Woods unexpected became famous as a vigorous batsman, with his average increasing from 19 to 33 and he hit three brilliant centuries. In fact, only seven players bettered his 1405 runs that season, and his bowling was, for the last time, valuable to Somerset with 86 wickets in all games.
He was an attacking captain, once famously observing: "Draws? They're only for bathing in."[1]
That winter, Woods went on a tour to South Africa, but had little opportunity because of George Lohmann's deadly bowling on the matting wickets, and in 1896 his bowling became utterly irrelevant - he did not take five wickets in a Championship innings - but his surprise development as a batsman was fully maintained during the rest of the 1890s despite occasional injury problems. His captaincy also held Somerset together as the players who had helped them to prominence in their first couple of years in the Championship declined. In 1902 and 1903, aided by Len Braund's wonderful all-round play, Somerset improved, but Woods, after having long ago lost his bowling, was no longer able to "force" the game as he could even a few years before, and he last reached the 1000 run mark in 1901.
Although he resigned the Somerset captaincy due to his generally poor form as a player after the 1906 season, the team's severe lack of players was such that he appeared fairly often until 1910 (scoring a brilliant hundred against Hampshire in 1908) and remained as secretary for some years after that. Indeed, Woods remained associated with Somerset right up to his death in 1931.
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[edit] Other Sports
Cricket was not Sammy Woods' only sport. He played and captained England at rugby union, playing a total of thirteen rugby union international matches for England between 1890 and 1895. He also played 'soccer' for Sussex, 'mixed' hockey for Somerset. He fished and hunted wherever possible and took up bowls in middle-age.
[edit] Other Notes
He served as a Captain in one of the Somerset Regiments during the Great War where he fought at Gallipoli.
Many anecdotes are told about Sammy Woods, in particular concerning his struggles with the examiners during his time at Cambridge, for he was no academic. One story recounted by Nancy Banks-Smith is that he was unable to answer a single question in his final Tripos at Cambridge. He wrote only "Dam" and then left the hall. His dons, all cricket enthusiasts, would - it is said - have passed him if only he had spelt the word correctly.[2]
He remained a very popular and well-known figure in the Taunton area even after his cricket-playing days were long over. When he died, Taunton was in a state of mourning.[3] R. C. Robertson-Glasgow wrote of him: If you wanted to know Taunton, you walked round it with Sam Woods on a summer morning before the match. Sam was Somerset's godfather.[4]
[edit] Notes
- ^ Wisden article with much on Woods
- ^ See the "Hard Spell" paragraph
- ^ "Sammy became a legend with cider county"
- ^ RC Robertson-Glasgow, 46 Not Out, first published by Hollis & Carter, 1948, p129 of the Sportsman's Book Club edition.
[edit] References
"My Reminiscences" (1925) by SMJ Woods
